Mary Bernard's Customization and Programming NotesKeyboard Customization |
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The Keyboard is a good place to start customizing. It's easier than XPL programming, and the keyboard table itself contains lots of examples.
First, copy your keyboard file, NB.KBD, unchanged, to a safe place. Better still, copy it under a new name, and make changes to the new kbd. (You could call it TRYOUT.KBD, or NEW.KBD.)
You should print out NBKEY.KEY. In order to do keyboard customization efficiently, you should open your NB.KBD and, using the Unshifted keyboard as reference, write the key numbers beside the names (e.g., 1: Esc; 59: F1)--or use the diagram and list on Rick Penticoff's website--see Resources.
It's easy to forget what key customizations you have made. If you do much keyboard customizing, you may want to make a keyboard diagram with NB's key numbers on each key, print out a diagram for each shift state of the keyboard, and label the appropriate keys with your customizations. There are diagrams of the American and British standard Windows XP keyboards in Appendix II of the new Customization and Programming Guide.
If you do much keyboard customizing, you may want to make a blank keyboard diagram, print out one for each shift state of the keyboard, and label the appropriate keys with your customizations. It's easy to forget some. (I have keyboard diagrams of all the shift states for my Vaio laptop, which I would be happy to pass on to other NB users. They are SmartDraw drawings (.SDR), but I can convert them to .TIFs or JPGs.)
You need to find empty keys in your keyboard tables for your customizations. This is easy for SWS users--the Ctrl+Alt table has lots of spaces. It's harder for Lingua users, but there are some spaces; and you can remove any of the accented character in the Ctrl+Alt and Ctrl+Shift+Alt keyboards that you don't use. If you use them rarely, consider using the keys for customizations, and inputting the characters with the F6 Accents and Modifiers popup.
NB: A quick way of finding empty keys is to search for the string 'NO'. But don't put any definitions on the Ctrl, Shift or Alt keys, in any of the keyboards. You can check their key numbers at the top of the file.
You can also move key definitions around--from virtually any key, to virtually any key. A simple move made by many Nota Bene users is to transfer the definition that toggles between two open windows from Ctrl+Shift F8 to Unshifted F8, which is an unused key--changing:
66=NO
to
66=CC
Another way of gaining keyboard real estate is to put this key definition on a keyboard key:
##=SG
This allows you to enter any of your phrase library phrases by striking that key, then the letter the phrase is stored on. (I have SG on Shift+Space, so that, for instance, striking Shift+Space, then the letter J, enters the text--or runs the program--on phrase J of my currently loaded phrase library.)
You can then put your own customizations on all the @+alphanumeric keys in the Alt+Shift keyboard table: 35 extra keys.
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